Leaving the coast

Debut should put Long Island band on national stage

Envy on the Coast has a bit of Glassjaw's rage, Brand New's craftiness and Taking Back Sunday's raw emotion.

What makes the band's debut, "Lucy Gray," so special, though, is the way the quintet has boiled down those influences into a singular vision of what should come next for a generation that sings "You're So Last Summer" with the reverence of a church hymn.

It makes sense. After all, Envy on the Coast -- singer Ryan Hunter, guitarists Brian Byrne and Sal Bossio, bassist Jeremy Velardi and drummer Dan Gluszak -- is part of that generation.

Envy offers a good example of the winning post-emo combination of brainy and brawny rock, a mixture of feelings and full-on guitar roar. On "If God Smokes Cheap Cigars," the band takes it a step further, using the song's form to support its message. It races through the verses to create an adrenaline rush and then slows down the chorus to hammer home the point, "I'll stop to worry when I'm dead." Though "Lucy Gray" is a debut, the band members fill their songs with the clever little touches of masters twice their ages -- an elegant drum fill here, a piano twinkle there, all without losing any guitar-driven momentum or compromising the stadium-ready anthemic choruses.

Envy on the Coast may be best known on Long Island, but "Lucy Gray" is too potent an album to stay in New York -- or even indie -- for long.

RATING: 4 SOUND LEVELS

[GLENN GAMBOA, NEWSDAY]

Underground Kingz

"UGK"

The ambitious new double album from the Underground Kingz Pimp C and Bun B packs in so many high-profile hip-hop visitors it sounds like a weekend at Diddy's in the Hamptons -- including UK grime star Dizzee Rascal, Big Daddy Kane, Charlie Wilson and Jazze Pha. OutKast's Andre 3000 is a thrill in the unstoppable first single, "Int'l Players Anthem (I Choose You)," which, like much of the album, takes a '70s soul base, coats it with a Dirty South vibe and piles on the laid-back rhymes. Despite all this guest-starpower, it's Pimp C and Bun B that are the real kings of "UGK," cobbling together what could be the next big break for hip-hop.

RATING: 3 1/2 SOUND LEVELS

[GLENN GAMBOA, NEWSDAY]

Korn "UNTITLED"

Being down to three original members hasn't cost Korn its knack for haunted hard-rock melody. Jonathan Davis is still raging, searching, disgusted and warning "happiness is boring, need pain instead." On "Kiss," he even sounds wistful, tuneful, sad. Korn only slips on "Bitch, We Got a Problem," drifting toward banal nu-metal formula, a big mistake for any band that still has new ideas to peddle.

RATING: 3 SOUND LEVELS

[STEVE APPLEFORD, L.A. TIMES]

The Jonas Brothers "THE JONAS BROTHERS"

This freshly scrubbed pop-punk act hit it big this year with Radio Disney listeners hungry for a Green Day minus curse words and lefty politics. On their largely self-penned second album, the Jonases toughen up the guitars but keep the girl-craziness clean: Think Franz Ferdinand for 5th graders.